Friday, February 22, 2013

Deadlift PR

Last night's scheduled CrossFit workout was a non-starter for me. The workout was very simple - 75 Kettlebell Turkish Get-Ups. Most people have never done a Turkish Get-Up or even heard of the lift, but it's one that would not be kind to my shoulder. After talking to a sports med doctor and a chiropractor, I've decided to stay away from any over-the-head pressing movements for a while. And, a Turkish Get-Up requires you to hold a weight overhead for the entire rep. It would probably take me 22-25 minutes to do 75 reps, and that is a long time to be holding a kettlebell overhead.

So, I decided to do some heavy deadlifts, which I hadn't done in a while, followed by a standard CF workout called Cindy.

Here are my reps for the deadlifts:

5x135

5x225

3x275

2x315

That was essentially my warm-up, and I then switched to single rep sets:

335

355

375

395

These felt relatively easy until the 395 pound rep, which was challenging. My PR of 415 pounds was set on 10/15 of last year, doing a workout called CrossFit total, where I set PRs for the strict press, back squat and deadlift all in the same day. So, rather than continuing my pattern of adding 20 pounds to each rep, I added 25 pounds for a total of 420 pounds on the bar. It wasn't pretty, but I nailed it and set a new PR. This was at least my third lifting PR this year. I also set PRs for the snatch and the clean and jerk last month.

After the 420 pound rep, I was done with the deads and it was time for Cindy - a very simple workout. You simply do 5 pull-ups, 10 push-ups and 15 air squats as many times as possible in 20 minutes. I modified it a bit last night, opting for 10 rounds as quickly as possible. It took me 16:06 to do those 10 rounds.

Today is a rest and recovery day. With the new snow in the mountains this past week, and more snow expected tomorrow, I imagine I'll be skiing in the trees again this weekend. I need a rest day so I can keep up with my students in the trees.